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{{quote|''"You know how when you make a copy of a copy, it's not as sharp as, well, the original?"''|'''Doug Kinney #3''', ''[[Multiplicity]]''}}
{{quote|''"Like a bad photocopy, each one is a little darker than the last."''|'''Batman''', referring to the Everywhere Man, ''[[
When dealing with fiction that [[Cloning Blues|clones]] things, the assumption is often made that clones must, after time, decay. That is, with each copy you make whatever [[Applied Phlebotinum]] you are using to create the clones will either decrease in effectiveness, or the clones themselves become less coherent since eventually everything is just a copy of a copy. This goes double for dead clones, who [[Everything Fades|tend to dissolve]] because they're "[[What Measure Is a Non-Human?|less than human]]" rather than leave a proper corpse.
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When dealing with a character who has the ability to [[Respawning Enemies|create clones apparently out of thin air]], this weakness is usually the only thing holding them back from whatever it is they're trying to do.
Uses very similar logic to [[Super Prototype]] and [[Conservation of Ninjutsu]]. The [[Super Prototype]], when it is a one-of-a-kind machine, is awesome and unstoppable. Clones, likewise, seem really great at
In some instances it may be a [[Justified Trope]]: the creator may "program" a shortened lifespan into the clone to protect their property from getting away. Relatedly, the degeneration may be because the process used to make the clone resulted in a [[Flawed Prototype]], making all the clones a form of [[Keystone Army]] that will croak on some future date or circumstance. If the hero has [[Expendable Clone|qualms about killing clones]], their degeneration lays them to rest. Whether out of being a [[Mercy Kill]] or making them seem ''less real'' varies.
See also [[Power Degeneration]], which also applies to clones designed with powers.
Note that this trope does have some grounding in [[Real Life]]: Cloning isn't a fully documented science yet, and genetic kinks in the cloning process, such as shortened telomeres and genomic imprinting, remain factors that may lead to clones having shorter life expectancies than their originals. Clones of clones tend to be even worse off.
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== Anime and Manga ==
* In ''[[Ah!
** In the
** The main manga and series feature a clone of Urd. The Urd clone can use all the same magic as Urd, but her inferior body can't handle the stress.
* Clones in ''[[Gundam Seed]]'' tend to have physical or mental problems. Case in Point: {{spoiler|Rau Le Cruset}}.
** Another example would be Prayer Reverie in the [[Gundam SEED Astray|Astray mangas]], who was okay in the head, but was basically an [[Ill Girl]] for most of the Astray X series, {{spoiler|and was able to convincingly fake a death of "natural causes" at the apparent age of nine}}
* This is the reason why {{spoiler|Zest Grangaitz}} of ''[[Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha]]'' was considered an imperfect [[Super Soldier|Artificial Mage]]. He got the memories, abilities, and personality of the original, but his body was suffering from severe health problems.
** Averted with {{spoiler|Fate Testarossa}}, who appears completely healthy over a decade and a half after her creation, as well as {{spoiler|Erio Mondial}}, who has been alive for at least a decade as of Force.
*** {{spoiler|Fate}} is an interesting example. Although she has none of the issues seen in this trope, she isn't a perfect clone, either. Changes in personality, eye color, and other small details mark her as a distinctly unique individual, which led to her ultimate classification as 'failed clone' despite the fact that her incredible raw magical aptitude perhaps make her even better than the original.
* In ''[[Fate/stay
* In her last few scenes, [[Neon Genesis Evangelion|Rei Ayanami's]] limbs had a tendency to ... fall off. Her body, being a {{spoiler|1=mishmash of Lilith and Yui's DNA,}} isn't capable to holding together without Rei's AT field to counter the effects of imperfect cloning. After [[Heroic RROD|expending so much of her energy to counter Kaworu the previous day]], she can't hold herself together.
* The Sisters in ''[[
* In the ''[[Ghost in
* In the fifth ''[[
* [[Mahou Sensei Negima|Negi]] employs several paper doll clones of himself in chapter 36, without knowing exactly how it works. This trope ensues...
** This trope may be the reason of [[We Hardly Knew Ye|Quartum's and Quintum's]] [[Curb Stomp Battle|Curb Stomping]].
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** Given how they can fight against each other, they're probably capable of independent thought and, given Naruto's natural rebelliousness, prone to disobeying.
*** By the time of manga chapter 550 his clones have received a sizeable upgrade, becoming capable of taking out Kage-level opponents on their own without the original present.
* ''[[Lupin III]]: [[
{{quote|
'''Lupin:''' But you are always distorted by your obsession.
'''Dying Mamo clone:''' [[Who Wants to Live Forever?|But is it not... everyone's obsession]]? }}
==
* This is how Bizarro is often depicted in the [[DCU]].
* ''[[Spider-Man (Comic Book)|Spider-Man]]'': Every clone [[The Clone Saga|created by the Jackal]] was subject to this. Some of them were almost identical to the originals but aged / disfigured, while others would last so long and then spontaneously collapse into a pile of mush - Jackal triggered this in his "mini-me", Jack, as punishment for giving Ben Reilly information. It even drove one, [[Meaningful Name|Kaine]], insane. Ben Reilly succumbed to it when he died. (And in ''[[
* Slo-Bo from ''[[Young Justice (
* In a crossover of ''[[Simpsons]] Comics'' and ''Bartman'', Celebrity Troy McClure gained the [[I Love Nuclear Power|radiation explosion]] created identity of "The Sequelizer". His sequel-generating powers allowed him to create duplicates of himself, but each copy was only half as strong as the previous one.
== Film ==
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*** Five years from his diagnosis with cancer, mind you, closer to ''sixty-five'' years after his production.
** In the [[Star Wars Expanded Universe]] comic series ''[[Dark Empire]]'', The Emperor died with the second Death Star, but had clones stashed away somewhere, and about ten years later he reemerged as head of [[The Empire]]. Since he was skilled with the Dark Side and all, he could [[Body Surf]] through the clones, [[Cloning Gambit|taking up from where he left off]]. However, his stored genes had been sabotaged, making it so that none of the clone bodies could last very long. And it got worse for him when some traitorous [[Mooks]] killed most of the stored clones.
* The Michael Keaton film ''[[Multiplicity]]'', about a man who has himself cloned, has one of the clones cloned, and he came out rather... [[The Ditz|special]].
* "GEFs", clone bodies used for hazardous occupations in the movie ''[[Body Surf|XChange]]'', have a life span of only three days, after which they begin rapidly decomposing. Naturally, the protagonist gets stuck in one that's already been alive for two days. {{spoiler|The villain ends up in this body just as its time runs out--then appears not to dying at first because its timer is a few minutes off.}}
** Same with the clones in the original novel ''[[Mindswap]]'' by [[Robert Sheckley]], on which the movie is ''very'' loosely based.
* ''[[
* [[Word of God]] for ''[[Primer]]'' states that doubles created via [[Time Travel]] are imperfect copies. This is the reason for Aaron and Abe's earbleeds and the degradation of their handwriting when they begin altering their past.
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== Literature ==
* In David Brin's novel, ''Kiln People'', humans are able to create duplicates of themselves that are fashioned from a type of clay. The duplicates, called golems or "dittoes", possess the memories of their original from the time of their creation, but degrade after a day. Before this happens, golems are able to reintegrate their accumulated memories with their original using a special device.
* Invoked in F.M. Busby's ''Rissa Kerguelen'' series. The Hulzein clan learns through painful experience that they have to alternate cloned generations with ones produced the normal way, or else they wind up with mentally unstable
* In [[William Sleator]]'s ''[[
* In Suzanne Weyn's ''The Bar Code Rebellion'', several clones are made of a single woman, each one with more and more bird DNA added to them. The first few are somewhat normal, though with notable strange behaviors and abilities. Once we reach the fifth clone, KM-5, it's become quite clear that the more bird DNA they possess, the crazier they are. The final clone, KM-6, is extremely weak, thin, and pale, and speaks only in bursts of birdlike noise.
* Though technically not because of being a clone, (and not actually being a "clone" in the strictest sense) Bean of the Ender's Shadow series is this because of {{spoiler|Anton's Gene being activated}} in him, which makes him smarter because his {{spoiler|brain and body never stop growing}} at the cost of becoming {{spoiler|a giant and eventual death}}
* ''[[Who Censored Roger Rabbit?
* The novel ''[[Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang]]'' centers around this, in a way. A post-apocalyptic society rendered sterile by disease discovers that, though clones do display
** The clones display a form of
* The Styx Drones from ''[[Colony]]'' are this. Each batch suffers from further deterioration of intelligence, leaving the present batch [[Too Dumb to Live]].
== Live Action TV ==
* In ''[[Star Trek:
* ''[[Stargate SG
** Though Beckett's cellular degeneration issues {{spoiler|were eventually solved, effectively making him the original [[Back
** Also note that in the case of O'Neill's clone, the degeneration is a case of having [[You Have Outlived Your Usefulness]] literally encoded in his genes. In fact, he's overcome with pain within ''minutes'' of being recovered by Loki.
** Kull Warriors are created in nonliving form and animated via Ancient technology They live for several days or weeks, though they're [[Super Soldier|extremely hard to kill]] before their time.
** There is a bit of [[Fridge Logic]] there, as the Asgard should've anticipated that their clones would degrade after millennia of copying copies. Apparently, in a case of [[No Plans, No Prototype, No Backup]], they did not keep an original DNA somewhere. This is actually a plot point in a later episode, where they recover an original Asgard and try to gain his DNA. {{spoiler|This fails spectacularly.}}
* The single-clone degeneration is addressed but ultimately averted in ''[[
* In an episode of the ''[[Honey I Shrunk the Kids (TV series)|Honey I Shrunk the Kids]]'' TV series that seems to have been losely based on ''Multiplicity'', Wayne creates a molecular duplication machine that has the side effect of making the target's molecules unstable, causing them to create more duplicates whenever they are bumped hard against something or jolted. This results in a good number of extra Waynes, nearly all of which are a bit dense. "Why are my clones such ''dorks''?"
== Tabletop Games ==
* The fetches of ''[[Changeling: The
* ''[[Paranoia (
** The reason that bit about colour blindness isn't potholed to [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking]]? In Alpha Complexing, social rank is [[
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* This is the reason you don't make copies of AIs in the ''[[Halo]]'' universe. In the ''First Strike'' novel, Cortana used alien technology to create new (slightly flawed) instances of herself in a Covenant warship so she could be in two places at once. The copies made copies. The copies of the copies made copies. The quickly-growing swarm of AIs started forking off copies for specialized tasks, having those copies be overwhelmed by Covvie AIs, and spinning off more copies. Eventually the alien ship filled its computers to the roof with Cortana clones, segfaulted, and blew up. It was pretty awesome.
** Though the "blowing up" part was entirely deliberate. Even as flawed as the copies were, they still managed to complete their mission.
** This also applies to human clones. Individual organs can be cloned and used for transplants without a problem, it's when you clone the whole body do things go south. The flash clones (which are the only method of cloning seen in the Halo universe) is where the clones are aged up to the person who supplied the DNA. The clone will have the mind of an infant, given that it has zero memories, and the body will deteriorate and quickly die within a couple months. Apparently the cloned body's metabolism just can't stabilize itself correctly. The procedure is highly illegal.
*** Clones are used to cover up the Spartan II project. ONI took the children, and gave the parents flash clones. As far as any of the parents could guess, their children inexplicably went into a vegetative state and died from an unknown disease.
*** Flash-cloned brains are the only way of making "smart" AIs. Cortana, for example, was created by scanning the cloned brain of Dr. Halsey, the creator of the Spartans. This gets a little weird in one novel when Cortana mentions to Halsey that she thinks John-117 (Master Chief) is cute. Halsey knows that this must be what she thinks as well, even though she is the Spartans' mother figure. Of course, since he never takes off his helmet, we'll never know.
** Don't forget that Cortana got the copy program off of a heavily degraded yet "somehow familiar" Covenant AI. Along with the presence of a time-manipulation device, its insinuated that she got the program from one of her own (completely insane) [[Stable Time Loop|time-lost copies]].
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* ''[[Tales of the Abyss]]'' features this, along with everything else from the [[Cloning Blues]] vat. But since this ''is'' a Tales game, it plays around with the trope too: {{spoiler|it turns out that getting a clone made can cause just as many problems to the original as it does to the copy. In the best case, the original develops severe health problems after a while. In the worst, the original dies ''as soon as the data required to create a clone in the first place is extracted''}}.
** {{spoiler|Actually, in the best case, the replica is weaker but there is no particular degeneration in the original. In the very worst case, however, that of complete isofons, a different effect occurs. The original and replica are so entirely identical that both gradually begin to destabilize due to the interference of their matching fonon frequencies. Eventually, one or both will die, and their fonons merge, creating an individual with the memories of both the original and the replica. This is what physics says happened to Luke fon Fabre at the end of the game, according to some easily-missable sidequests with Jade.}}
* This is the premise of ''[[Destroy All Humans!]]''. The Blisk had mutated Furon DNA so that they can't propagate due to lack of genitalia. Fortunately, they perfected the art of cloning, rendering them virtually immortal. Unfortunately, each new clone has degraded Furon DNA, making the results more unpredictable and eventually leading to the extinction of the Furon race. Fortunately, this could be fixed via infusion of uncorrupted DNA, and a Furon mothership happened upon another planet eons earlier and frolicked with the planets' inhabitants, giving the their descendants Furon DNA. Unfortunately for us but fortunately for them, that planet is Earth.
* Not necessarily clones, but close enough: In the ''[[Legacy of Kain]]'' series, Kain used parts of his soul to resurrect a group of long-dead Sarafan warrior priests as his lieutenants, each receiving a smaller part of his soul than the last, which would directly affect their evolution in vampiric unlife: Raziel received the most of his soul and evolved the quickest, while Melchiah received the smallest part, making his body vulnerable to decay.
* This may explain why Taokaka from ''[[
* The God of ''[[The Neverhood]]'' eventually ended up creating the whole world's population this way. He was trying to duplicate himself, but the duplicate just assumed that he was really God, and went through the whole process all over again. This continued until eventually a duplicate was created that was not alive.
** That was just one God of one world that was not the Neverhood. The Neverhood itself was created by someone who took the opposite approach and personally crafted each thing to be completely unique and everlasting.
* ''Fallout 3'' gives us Vault 108, which contains nothing but very aggressive clones. Notes left throughout the vault state that the first clone was fine, but copies made after that became more violent the farther they were from the original.
* Alluded to in ''[[Republic Commando]]'' whenever the player performs some suicidally dumb action.
{{quote|
* Justified in the usual manner in ''[[Dystopia (
* ''[[Final Fantasy VII]] [[Crisis Core]]'' is a prequel, giving us background on stuff like why Sephiroth went crazy and destroyed Cloud's hometown. A huge part of it turns out to be the emotional blows he suffered when losing his two closest friends to [[Mistreatment-Induced Betrayal]] against [[Mega Corp|Shinra]]; the primary mistreatment in this case being that Shinra had created them via genetic hacking and then, at some point in their thirties, their bodies started to break down. And that was when they found out they weren't just naturally talented best friends from Banora, where the scientist running the project apparently retired after Hojo got all the funding in order to make [[Super Prototype|Sephiroth]].
** Genesis, the one who actually went [[Ax Crazy]], may have minded that Sephiroth was perfect and the project that wasn't abandoned as much as the dying part. Never mind that Project G being mostly-canceled meant ''he'' got a ''childhood''; he had a [[Green-Eyed Monster]] problem.
** The degeneration condition is like this, but Angeal and Genesis aren't actually clones, as such. Angeal may even be his mother's natural son, she just messed with her own body so much to get the cells to make Genesis that he came out weird. Or not. (Incidentally, this means Angeal and Genesis are at least 1/3 brothers, which is not a fraction that's possible in nature and which also makes the fact that they're a popular ship a lot [[
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* Meta example: any sufficiently popular webcomic will inevitably spawn imitators, which are generally not as good as the original. The more popular ones in turn will eventually spawn their own imitators, which are even worse.
* [[Lampshaded]] in [http://bobadventures.comicgenesis.com/d/20080621.html this] strip from ''[[The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob]],'' where Molly's [[Cloning Blues|clone]] Galatea insists on using Molly's tissues for an experiment rather than her own.
* In ''[[
* In [[Kevin and Kell]], Corrie's clone, Dolly, begins aging rapidly as a result of being a clone. Dolly becomes concerned about how her adoptive parents, the Canids, will feel about this so Corrie (who had originally been adopted before Dolly took her place) switches with Dolly, who poses as her birth mother. An accident with a time machine results in Dolly being de-aged to a baby, which gives her a fresh start on life even if her rapid aging resumes (which is somewhat unlikely to happen, given the nature of how time progresses in the strip).
* Subverted in ''[[
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== Western Animation ==
* One [[Treehouse of Horror]] special in ''[[The Simpsons (
* This seemed to be inherent to present-day cloning in '[[
* In ''[[
* The Ring of the Nine Dragons from ''[[
* In the rather bizarre miniseries ''House Of Cosbys'', the Bill Cosby clones get increasingly bizarre defects, however the main character keeps making them as every tenth Cosby has superpowers. Unfortunately, Cosby #100 happens to be pure evil.
* In an episode of ''[[
* ''[[Men in Black (
* In ''[[
* [[
* An experiment in ''[[Lilo
* Drakken tried this in ''[[
* In ''[[
* A very [[Squick
** Later, Stewie makes a perfect clone of himself- but this one is [[Evil Knockoff|immensely more evil]] [[Gone Horribly Right|than him]]- complete with [[Slasher Smile]].
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